Some Secrets are better left Dead
by Fandomfanatic2
Summary: Being Clint Barton's adopted sister wasn't easy, finding out your brother is not only involved in organized Crime but part of the Worlds deadliest crime organization, The Avengers that makes things even more difficult. How do you hide, where do you run from The Avengers? Especially once a certain pair of Super Soldiers take a particular interest in you?
1. Chapter 1

Life growing up wasn't easy from an early age. My dad was incarcerated when I was 6 years old, sentenced to life in prison for Vehicular Manslaughter and drunk driving. He and my mom got into a fight one night, he, like always, drank away his problems and decided to get behind the wheel of a car killing the 16-year-old he hit head-on when the whiskey finally knocked him out.

After that accident life got harder for mom and me, everyone seemed to blame her for dads actions and being in a small town where everyone likes to talk it seemed to make the town smaller. We moved out of state when I was almost 8, the whispers and staring becoming too much for her. Roughly 6 months later the stress and guilt became too much, I came home from school one afternoon to find my mom "asleep" laying next to an empty bottle of pills and a note addressed to me. Although I remember it like it was yesterday that whole day after that was a blur.

I didn't have any other known family, you can't exactly raise a kid in prison, so I was placed in a children's home and became a ward of the state. For 2 and a half years I bounced in and out of State homes and foster homes, given what I had went through I shut down, closing everyone off I visited more counselors and therapists than I can remember I also found myself in fights around every corner, that typically being the reason I got kicked from most foster homes. Right around my 11th birthday, I found myself in a state home with only a few other kids, most of the children just ignored me and I preferred it that way. No one wanted to talk to the crazy girl who didn't speak and doodled in a journal all day, that is until my life changed forever.

I was sitting under the big oak tree out in front of the old church that had been converted into a children's home. One of the older boys, Daniel, who had just arrived in the home a week or so ago walked up to me a small group lingering behind him. He started taunting me about my notebook like everyone liked to do, trying to get me to say something, anything, but I wouldn't budge. After maybe 10 minutes of ignoring him, my journal was snatched from my hand, I jumped to my feet ready to charge the jerk when something flew through the air crashing into the side of his head, Daniel dropped my journal grabbing his head in pain in an instant. Everyone started looking around to see where the object came from, finally looking up to the tree behind me they saw him, perched like a bird about half way up was a sandy blonde haired boy I came to know as Clint armed with a simple slingshot. The group quickly dispersed once the realized clint had a pocket full of rocks and an aim that shouldn't be tested, he jumped from the tree picked up my journal and handed it back to me. I didn't know it then, but that moment was the beginning of a new life for me. For weeks after that clint continued to come around, he didn't try to talk to me like everyone else did, he just sat perched in the tree while I doodled always on alert, just watching me like a hawk. 3 months after my first interaction with clint I was jumped on my way to the tree out front, Daniel didn't take too kindly to Clint's actions apparently, just as I thought I was about to get my ass handed to me, one of the guys who jumped me was pulled off and thrown into the others, I looked up and there he was again saving my tail. That was the day I broke my silence, thanking clint for his rescue yet again. From that moment on I talked, only to him at first, but then slowly over the months I started speaking to others my social worker was floored, the fighting also slowed down that day too, most kids were too wary of clint to pick a fight with me. I didn't know it at that moment but I had found a brother in Clint Barton, one that would stick with me no matter where we went.

For two and a half years clint and I became inseparable, Clint was a few years older than me though and was aging out of the home and that scared both of us. In all of my silent brooding, I managed to test up in school and was eligible to graduate early, my social worker advised against it citing I needed more social interaction, but ultimately the choice was mine and I took it. Clint tried community college for a couple of semesters but we both knew this town wasn't big enough for him, after a lot of talking, tears, and a few stolen bottles of beer later he decided to join the military and try to see the world. Telling him to go was a tough decision but I promised him I wouldn't be far behind him. 6 months after he left for basic I ran away from the home, and never looked back.

Clint had taught me how to drive in a beat up pickup he bought, so when I ran I stole a car or two to put some distance between me and that place. I found jobs in diners where people didn't really care to ask my age as long as I showed up and did my job, I hustled pool to earn extra cash when things were slow, I didn't tend to stay in one town long usually 6 months at best. Somewhere between my 19th and 20th birthday I found myself in New York City, I had enough saved to rent a room from someone I found in an ad in the paper, I got a job at a Coffee shop part-time. Money got tight a few months in and I was scared I would have to move again, until one day a co-worker mentioned she wrote freelance articles for a local paper and suggested I try it. This was another one of those moments I had no idea would change my life, a few articles here and there somehow lead to a part-time job at the Midtown Journal. I started off in the mail room still submitting my freelance articles and worked my way up, a year and a half later I'm one of the top Investigative Journalists in New York City. Chasing stories no one else wanted, showing the world parts of the city no one wanted to believe existed, and maybe even making a few enemies along the way. This career path is exactly what lead me to the predicament I am in now, my name is Layla James and this is my story.


	2. Chapter 2

I groaned as I rolled over, reaching for my phone, the Golden Girls theme song playing for the 3rd time this morning, Wade was anything if not persistent.

"What!?" I croaked into the phone, my dry throat painfully obvious.

"Is that any way to talk to someone who has an order of Donuts and Coffee on its way to your front door as we speak?" My Best friend Wade asked feigning annoyance. "Now get your ass out of bed before the grub hub guy eats your Birthday breakfast."

"Birthday?" I mumbled, glancing at my phone checking the date, sure enough, March 9th. "Oh, shit" I whispered seeing the excess amount of notifications on my phone.

"Seriously, it's the same day every fucking year, after 24 of them you would think you would have this figured out. Remind me, how are you the smart one again?" he asked sarcastically.

"Shut up" I grumbled, climbing out of bed after hearing a light knock at the door. "and Thanks for Breakfast Wade, I gotta run I'll talk to you later"

"Anytime Ace, at least one of us remembered. Oh and Happy Birthday". After taking the food, and thanking the driver I plopped down on the couch to catch up on the morning news.

I was mindlessly scrolling through my social media, listening to the News when the newscaster caught my attention.

"Tony Stark steps down as head of Stark Industries, former assistant Pepper Potts named CEO," She says.

Now, why in the hell would Billionaire Tony Stark pass running his company over to a glorified secretary? I rewound the clip while chugging my coffee watching for any hints of anything strange, well stranger than the segment itself. The Video showed Tony at some Gala, cheesing it up for the camera, as usual, a fiery redhead on his arm. Stark was a notorious playboy, aside from his assistant he seemed to have a different woman on his arm for every event he attended. The clip also showed Starks massive tower in the heart of New York City, it was his newest project and had only gotten completed a few years ago when he moved his company here from California, after having changed his focus from Military grade weapons to energy, there were rumors already that stark was working on a new facility somewhere but no one had managed to lock down a location, yet. After watching the clip 3 more times I decided I had my new project, I was going to get to the bottom of Starks strange behavior. What could it be Illness? Midlife Crisis? Maybe even blackmail? Whatever it is I'm going to get to the bottom of it.

I jumped from the couch and started working on getting ready to head to the office, putting my shoulder length chestnut brown hair into a high ponytail tossed on a vintage Tee and some jeans and slid on my blue converse, my signature work look, then I was out the door.

25 minutes later I strolled into my office at the Midtown Journal, a woman on a Mission. I knew I wouldn't have long to prep for our weekly assignment meeting, so I sat down and started digging. I started with known associates, business and others. Pepper his assistant was an obvious one, along with his Driver slash Security Happy Hogan but other than the basics there wasn't a whole lot there, at least not on the surface. I looked into Tony's former business partner Obadiah Staine but came up empty, his departure from the company had been very sudden 3 years ago, right around the time of the switch from Weapons to Energy and he hadn't really been heard from publicly since definitely something to look into. A few more quick social searches showed that Stark had suddenly been seen hanging out with notorious Scientist Banner, that was strange. Banner had vanished off the face of the planet a few years ago after an experiment gone wrong and had only resurfaced in the last 6 months or so.  
I started scrolling through a collection of pictures of Tony from the last year and was surprised to see that redhead again at least a dozen times, who was she and why was she important enough to be seen with Tony "I don't wear the same thing twice" Stark? Definitely, something to look into. Glancing at the clock I quickly saved everything I could into a file aptly named "Mr. Money Bags" and jotted down some notes to mention to my editor and headed towards the conference room for our weekly Meeting. Being one of the only investigative Journalists on the team had its perks, it afforded me more time to dig into my article, I wasn't a slave to a deadline like everyone else working on weekly prints, but that didn't mean I didn't have to still sit through these boring meetings while everyone presented their assignments for the week.

An hour into the meeting, 35 minutes of which was spent listening to the Sports columnist and entertainment editor argue over who should cover some game that involved the husband of some Pop singer or something, it was finally my turn to present. I straightened up in my seat practically twitching with nerves over this prospective article. Uncovering the truth about Tony Stark could not only put our Little newspaper on the map, but throw myself and our staff to the next level, but I wasn't blind to the fact that Tony was also one of the wealthiest men in the world and that fact alone made him dangerous.  
Dean, along with his brother Sam, was the Editor in Chief of the paper and the one who gave me my big break, Sam was more like friendly competition given he was the other Investigative journalist on staff. I glanced from Dean to Sam and back to Dean before speaking.

"It was announced on the news this morning that Tony Stark is stepping down as CEO of Stark Enterprises, now before you go giving me that look hear me out," I Said, noticing Deans expression shifted as if he was prepared to argue. The Financial editor glared at me, probably mad I scooped his story.

"Stark is stepping down and handing over his fortune 500 company to his assistant Pepper Potts. That strike anyone else here as strange?" I asked glancing around the room.  
A few heads nodded others looked confused themselves, Deans expression was unreadable as he let me continue.

"Something is going on there, of all the people to pass it to why her and why now? I wanna do some digging and see if I can't find the bigger story behind this sudden change. I want to unearth everything I can about Tony Stark and blow this story out of the water." I finished, watching Dean for any type of reaction. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Sam move slightly before he finally spoke.

"You realize this could be nothing right? Also, digging into a man as powerful as Stark could be dangerous, why don't you let"  
"No!" I cut him off quickly, "I can handle it, Sam, I'm not passing this story off to you, besides don't you have some Slumlord to shake down or something?" I added rolling my eyes, irritated he would suggest I just hand off an assignment like this.

"Look I'm just saying Layla, you already have a laundry list of Enemies and I would hate for" "And I'm sure starks list is bigger Sam" I cut him off again, glaring daggers at the shaggy-haired brunette.

"Alright alright" Dean cut in, finally speaking. "You get 14 Days, come up with something Substantial in 2 weeks or I pass this story off to Sam. And It should go without saying but let me remind you to be careful"

I nodded, happy I won this confrontation, another 25 minutes later assignments had been passed out and we left the meeting everyone going our separate ways, I rushed straight to my office ready to jump into this.

Moments after I sat behind my desk I heard a light tap, looking up dean was standing in my doorway arms crossed leaning against the frame.  
" I know you're determined to turn this into a story, I just wanted to remind you to stay safe. Sometimes the story isn't worth risking everything."

"As Henry Anatole Grunwald Said "Journalism can never be silent: That is its greatest virtue and its greatest fault. It must speak, and speak immediately, while the echoes of wonder, the claims of triumph and the signs of horror are still in the air." You may think I'm crazy Dean, but I feel it there's a story here and I'm gonna prove it."

He must have seen the determination on my face because after a heavy sigh he conceded "Ok, let me know if you need anything. I'll do whatever I can to help you find the story. And if you need backup don't hesitate to take Sam, I know he annoys you but he's nearly as good a journalist as you, just don't tell him I said that." He added.

I chuckled at his confession and nodded, "Thanks, I'll let you know if something comes up."

He gave me a quick nod and tapped the door frame a few times before backing out the room, I fired my computer back up and sighed.

I've got work to do.


	3. Chapter 3

Well after 6 pm the faint sound of "Thank you for being a friend" rang out in my office, somewhere under my pile of papers and folders my phone was buried. Scrambling I found it quickly, nearly causing a disaster when my Coffee cup tipped over almost destroying an entire file on Tony's volunteer work, a focus on his sudden recent visits to Midtown Highschool and his investments in their science department. After averting disaster I found my phone answering quickly before Wade hung up.

"What's up?" I asked

"What's up? Dude, are you kidding me it's almost 6:30, Dinner? Sushi. Birthday Tradition." He spoke.

I groaned internally, I had forgotten yet again what day it was and lost track of time. When we met almost 2 years ago, I told wade of how my brother and I would go out every year on my birthday, so when we became friends he picked the tradition up.

Wade and I met when I was working on an article on a Cancer clinic ripping off their trial patients, he was one of the patients, and this article was my first big investigation. My article ended up getting the Clinic shutdown, but the attention it brought got another clinic to pick up the patients the clinic had screwed, Wade included. He doesn't talk about the situation much but we celebrated his 4th month in remission in February.

"I'm so sorry Wade, I spaced." I apologized as I started Scrambling to pack my desk up.

"I started this new investigation man and, well you know how I can get. Give me 25 minutes and I'll meet you at Chang's ok?"

"Fine" He sighed, "Just hurry up woman I'm starving"  
I rolled my eyes at his dramatics, packing up the last of my files in my backpack and closed up my office for the night. One shortish drive later I was pulling up at our favorite Chinese restaurant.

Walking through the door I nodded to the owner of the restaurant, who was working behind the counter, and made my way to mine and wades usual table in the corner where my grumpy friend was waiting for me.

"Again, I am so sorry Wade." I apologized taking a sip of the soda he had already ordered for me.

"Hey don't apologize to me, it's not my birthday. Food should be here in a minute, I ordered your usual, so what's got you in Veronica Mars mode?" He asked, pointing at the backpack I brought in, knowing I only do that for serious assignments.

"Tony Stark" I stated Matter of factly taking a bite out of one of the Cheese wontons he had ordered before I got there, nearly moaning at the taste, I may have forgotten to eat today.

"What about him? Disgruntled baby mama? Mystery Lovechild? Did he finally come out of the Closet? Cause if so Weasel owes me a lot of money."

I chuckled at that last statement and shook my head.

"No, well I don't know. He just up and handed his company to his assistant of 10 years. With no real explanation. Somethings gotta be up, and I'm gonna figure out what. No man in his right mind hands a fortune 500 company over to his glorified babysitter, not after the man who was best suited to take up the position just up and vanished in the last year."

"Wow, that got serious fast. So what's your angle? How are you working this?" he asked, glancing up as the waitress sat our food on the table, she was smiling and blushing at Wade who was oblivious. I smirked at the interaction, going to work on my food, I didn't realize it before but I was starving.  
"That's the catch" I added a few minutes later.  
"He's one of the most powerful men in the city, and nearly untouchable. Im pretty sure your bank account has to have at least 6 zeros to even got close enough to talk to him unless you luck out to become one of the bimbos on his arm for the night. He has a rocky relationship with the media, so I'll have to find another way in."  
Taking a bite of my shrimp fried rice I glanced at Wade, he looked deep in thought which was rare for him, finally, he spoke.

"What if I could get you in? Get you close enough to the man to gauge him yourself?"

"How could you do that?" I questioned sitting my fork down

"Well one of my "customers," last week said something about a Charity Concert this weekend, Starks into those public displays of Wealthiness I'm sure he wouldn't miss the chance to be there."

"Yeah" I agreed, "but I don't even have enough money to pretend I belong there how the hell do I get Invited?" I asked.

He smirked and looked at me, "Leave that up to me, let's just say she's a regular. I'll get the ticket, you handle the Dress and the date. I don't want you going in alone"

"Date?" Oh crap. "Can't I just take you?" I asked

"Oh Hell no, I can't risk running into multiple customers in one night. Plus I just don't want to. Why don't you ask that editor of yours that doesn't have a crush on you?"

"First of all gee thanks, Second of all He's my Boss. and Third, you're right I should probably take him, maybe it will help get him off my back about handing this over to Sam."

At that confession, Wade just gaped at me,  
"Don't you dare let Rocky, hand over this assignment to Bullwinkle just because they're brothers. Big asshat would destroy the whole thing like a bull in a china shop."  
I chuckled, Wade had only met Sam and Dean on a few occasions but they never seemed to get along, his description of the two wasn't entirely inaccurate.

"Right, well I'll get Dean on board just let me know when you get the tickets ok? Luckily I think I have a dress stored away for just this occasion."

Wade nodded and we continued to eat, changing the subject to mostly small talk, an hour later we had parted ways and I was heading home.

The week seemed to drag by, Wade held up his end of the Deal his Customer making good on the promise to get me a ticket to the Concert with a plus one.

Wade was a Male escort, mostly middle-class women whose husbands had mistresses of their own, occasionally he would strike up a customer on the upper end of the social scene which is where our ticket came from. After some groveling, begging and promises to proofread articles for the next month Dean agreed to be my plus one. I spent the week doing more research, I still couldn't get a name to match the mystery redhead, I also started to notice a few other faces pop up near Tony more frequently. After even more digging and using some questionable techniques I picked up over the years, I found some odd financial transactions in Starks records, a large plot of land was bought in upstate New York, some large transactions traded to a few mysterious shell companies it seemed. What was he doing and why did he buy land in the middle of nowhere upstate? It's about time I start getting some answers.


End file.
